Nick Saban, Lane Kiffin and the year that changed Alabama football forever
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Chris Low
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ESPN Senior Writer- College football reporter
- Joined ESPN.com in 2007
- Graduate of the University of Tennessee
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Alex Scarborough
TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — Former Alabama quarterback Blake Sims can still remember the feeling of that November night back in 2014, when he and the offense were standing on the field in overtime at LSU. With his mind and heart racing, and the roar of the Tiger Stadium crowd ringing in his ears, he shot a glance toward the sideline and Coach Nick Saban.
Less than 24 hours earlier, first-year offensive coordinator Lane Kiffin had come up with the play Sims was about to run — a daring empty set formation in which the offensive tackle, Cam Robinson, would split out wide as a receiver and a 305-pound reserve tight end, Brandon Greene, would masquerade as an offensive lineman.
The play’s name doubled as a sort of warning: Oh S—.
“Oh s—,” Kiffin had warned Sims and the rest of the offense in their team meeting the night before, “if this doesn’t work guys, Coach Saban is going to kill me on national TV.”
No blood was shed. LSU didn’t pick up on the fact that Greene was actually an eligible receiver as he took off down the middle of the field after the snap and hauled in a 24-yard reception on the first play of overtime, leading to a 20-13 Alabama victory.
“We all would have gotten our asses ripped if that play would have gone bad, not just Coach Kiffin,” said Sims. “But that’s the way Coach Kiffin rolls. He wasn’t afraid to take chances, and Coach Saban wasn’t afraid to take a chance on him … and you see what that’s led to.”
Much like that play, the pairing of Saban and Kiffin was high-risk at the time and genius in hindsight. And it has now come full circle, as Kiffin returns to Bryant-Denny Stadium to lead his No. 12 Ole Miss Rebels against Saban’s No. 1 Crimson Tide on Saturday.
But for the full story of how Alabama transitioned from ground-and-pound, game-manager-QB Alabama to high-flying, first-round-QBs-and-Heisman-winning-receiver Alabama, you have to start at the beginning, when the sport’s most accomplished head coach took a chance on the game’s most controversial.
“I remember him saying, ‘I feel like our offense is a Lamborghini, but it’s headed off a cliff,’ meaning we’ve got these great players, but are behind the times in what we’re doing,” said Kiffin, recalling their first meeting after he was hired. “So we needed to change directions.”
When Auburn‘s Chris Davis caught a missed field goal and returned it more than 100 yards for a game-winning score against Alabama in the 2013 Iron Bowl, it did more than dash any hope the Crimson Tide had of winning a third straight national title. It was the final signal to Saban that his program, despite its massive success, was beginning to grow outdated offensively.
While Auburn, Ole Miss and Texas A&M were using tempo and spreading the field with multiple receivers, Alabama was still putting the quarterback under center and still utilizing a mostly pro-style playbook.
Saban, after years of complaining about how the rules were tilted in favor of spread and hurry-up offenses, was eager to play catch-up with what he called the “fastball guys.”
So two weeks after losing to Auburn, an unlikely visitor started popping up at the Alabama practice field.
Center Ryan Kelly barely noticed Kiffin hanging around those few days in mid-December. Former coaches were always coming and going, Kelly explained.
Speaking to reporters, Saban brushed off the importance of Kiffin’s visit. Never mind that Kiffin was one of the most eccentric and divisive figures in college football. The 38-year-old had recently been fired by USC and was only four years removed from bailing on Tennessee after just one season.
Saban said hosting Kiffin was an opportunity for “professional development.”
“Obviously,” Kelly said, “that was the precursor to what was coming.”
Sims, who was a backup at the time but knew Kiffin from his recruitment by Tennessee, was one of the few players who put two and two together.
“I said, ‘We’re about to be deadly, so cold, because I knew what he would do with our offense,” Sims said. “It was the perfect combination, Coach Saban’s structure and Coach Kiffin’s creative mind.”
In the ensuing days, everything came together. Offensive coordinator Doug Nussmeier told Sims and the rest of the offense that the Sugar Bowl would be his last game at Alabama. He would eventually land the same job at Michigan.
During a recruiting visit, Saban pulled linebackers coach Lance Thompson into a bathroom for a private conversation. Thompson said Saban told him he had three candidates in mind to replace Nussmeier. One of them was Kiffin, whom Thompson had worked for at Tennessee.
Saban asked Thompson, now the inside linebackers coach at Florida Atlantic, what he thought.
“I’d hire Lane, Coach,” he said. “He’s a special playcaller.”
Thompson then paused for a moment. “But I’m going to tell you,” he said, “he’s different.”
Saban didn’t miss a beat.
“I ain’t never had a problem handling an assistant coach,” he said.
Saban would ultimately hire Kiffin and test his confidence about wrangling wayward assistants. Their personalities were so far apart, Thompson said, “It was like Earth and Neptune.”
Their collision caused fireworks at times, but more importantly, it led to the total re-imagining of Alabama’s offense and the resurrection of Kiffin’s career.
“People think you go there because it’s coaching rehab and you get a head job somewhere else,” Kiffin told ESPN earlier this week. “I guess that’s one way to approach it, and some people do. But for me, I look back at all of the things I learned under [Saban] that made me a better coach despite everything that’s been said about our time together and any differences we might have had.”
There were plenty of skeptics when Saban brought Kiffin on board.
“A lot of people might have been surprised when I brought Lane in as coordinator, probably even here in the building,” Saban told ESPN. “But I wanted to grow on offense. We needed to grow, and I felt like he was the best guy at that time to help us do that.”
But this wouldn’t be a simple course correction. Because while Saban wanted to implement the spread and use more tempo, Kiffin had very little history of doing either. At Tennessee and USC, he had run a similar pro-style attack as Alabama.
“He researched all that stuff and we’d go over it,” Saban said. “… So I was kinda learning it from him, and he was learning it from other people.”
For much of the next two years, Kiffin did his homework on those coaches and teams running up-tempo offenses with run-pass elements (RPOs). He paid careful attention to what his former USC brethren Steve Sarkisian was doing as head coach at Washington, racking up more than 600 total yards of offense in a game five times during the 2013 season.
There were also talks with Tom Herman when he was the offensive coordinator at Ohio State and Doug Meacham at TCU. Kiffin said he remained in touch with Chip Kelly, who was then in the NFL with the Philadelphia Eagles after coaching against Kiffin while at Oregon.
That April, during Kiffin’s first spring at Alabama, the Crimson Tide hosted their annual coaching clinic. There were a few usual suspects, such as former Alabama coaches Gene Stallings and Sylvester Croom, but among the headliners was someone with no ties to the school or Saban: Baylor coach and hurry-up offensive guru Art Briles, who was later fired in response to a review of the school’s handling of sexual assault allegations against students, including several football players.
Thompson said Briles’ attendance was no coincidence.
“There’s not a coach that comes to a clinic that Nick doesn’t sit down with individually and talk to and the coaches on the offensive and defensive side of the ball talk to those guys, too,” Thompson said. “Every coach from another program, every coach that’s brought in for an interview, is brought in for a purpose.”
That purpose: “To gain new information.”
Saban and Kiffin left no stone unturned. In their second year together, no-huddle guru Eric Kiesau was brought in on staff as an offensive analyst. Kiesau, now the receivers coach at Auburn, worked under Sarkisian at Washington and was previously the offensive coordinator at Colorado and passing game coordinator at Cal. He was a valuable sounding board for Kiffin on such things as using the sideline boards that help teams go faster on offense.
Alabama ran what was then a school-record 1,088 offensive plays in 2015 after running 1,018 the year before. The Tide had not run more than 898 plays in a season the previous four years.
“Everybody says that I go through so many guys on offense,” Saban said. “Look, I learn from all of them. We went through a transformation when Lane was here … intentionally. It was intentional. I wanted to, and he wanted to, too, and we’ve continued to build.”
The transition wasn’t seamless, though.
For instance: Kelly remembers how frustrated he was when he found out Kiffin wanted to scrap the traditional way quarterbacks signaled for the snap with a voice command like “hike” in favor of clapping. Kelly said he let it be known to his coaches, “How does this make sense? Like, anybody could be clapping, right?”
“There was give and take,” explained Kelly, who’s in his sixth season with the Indianapolis Colts.
That applied to the staff’s interaction with Kiffin, too.
One time, Kelly recalled, he thought offensive line coach Mario Cristobal was going to lose it on Kiffin.
“He was so close to walking into Lane’s office and strangling him,” Kelly said. “Because they were going out to practice and there were five new plays we hadn’t installed and no one could find Lane.”
Over time, Saban grew increasingly frustrated with what he said was a lack of organization on Kiffin’s part.
“I wanted things done a certain way,” Saban said. “I wanted the coaches to meet. I wanted everybody to have input, and that was not his style. Some of the other coaches complained to me about it, and I always said that Lane would be a much better head coach than an assistant because when you’re a head coach and you know what you want to do and you’ve got organized people around you, you really don’t need to be that organized.”
One assistant on that staff joked: “Lane Kiffin and Nick Saban were a match. It just wasn’t a match made in heaven.”
When Kiffin arrived in Tuscaloosa, Blake Sims was no one’s idea of a record-setting SEC quarterback.
AJ McCarron had just left for the NFL and former Florida State quarterback Jake Coker had transferred in, becoming the odds-on favorite to start.
The coaching staff loved Sims, but if they’re being honest, Thompson said, they were surprised he beat out Coker and started a single game. Even Sims admits he was recruited to Alabama by Kirby Smart to play free safety.
“He’d been Scout Team Player of the Week more than anybody in the history of Alabama football,” Thompson said. “He had played running back, safety, quarterback, wide receiver, fullback, tight end. The kid had played everything. He was such a wonderful kid. And then Lane comes and does a great job giving him stuff that he can do.”
Overnight, Sims transformed into a deft distributor of the football, making the kind of quick decisions that allowed All-America receiver Amari Cooper and others to shine.
That was no accident. Thompson said that during the lead up to the season, Kiffin shortened the terminology of plays, cutting 10-word calls in half in order to make things easier for everyone to understand, and Sims responded by passing for more yards (3,487) than anybody in the history of Alabama football had passed for to that point.
Whereas the year before the playbook was the size of a novel, Kelly said, it was suddenly condensed into a single chapter.
“To see a guy who really before that played kind of a utility role turn into that,” Kelly said of Sims, “that was obviously a lot of Lane’s doing. He figured out, ‘What’s this guy’s strengths and weaknesses? And let’s play those advantages.’ And that’s ultimately what he did the entire time I was there my last two years.”
Sims, who’s now playing for the Spokane Shock in the Indoor Football League, would watch tape with Cooper and running back Kenyan Drake of those Matt Leinart and Reggie Bush USC teams when Kiffin was the Trojans’ offensive coordinator.
“It was always amazing to me how he could see one play on film and know immediately how to attack the defense,” Sims said. “He could be standing on the field and see things nobody else could.”
In the Florida game that 2014 season, Kiffin pulled Sims and Drake aside before the game and devised a play for Drake to split out wide as a receiver and Sims to line up in the shotgun in an empty backfield. On the first play from scrimmage, Drake found himself matched against a linebacker and ran a slant-and-go route for an easy 75-yard touchdown reception.
Kiffin said they had never practiced that “sluggo” route with Drake, but that he had this “weird feeling” that Florida would be in man coverage.
“I thought about it at the last minute and we put it in in the locker room,” said Kiffin, adding that Bush ran that similar play for a long touchdown against Notre Dame in 2004.
Sims said: “You just didn’t see Alabama doing that kind of stuff before, but Coach Kiffin was great at getting those matchups and finding ways to get his best players the ball.”
As a playcaller, Saban said Kiffin is the best he’s ever been around.
“He sees how the defense is playing something and immediately knows,” Saban said, snapping his fingers for emphasis, “what he wants to run against it.”
Saban said it’s overblown how much he and Kiffin sparred that first season when it came to football, and even Kiffin said his former boss is a much better listener than people give him credit for, at least in certain areas.
“On scheme, yes. But not when it comes to the structure of his program,” Kiffin said. “It’s hard to argue that, though. Look at his success.”
Much like the “Oh S—” play against LSU, Kiffin was renowned for coming up with plays, even on the day of the game, which made it seem like sandlot football at times. And yes, he felt the wrath of Saban, but it usually was worth it.
“Some people when you get into a very structured environment like that, and you’re a little bit more of a color-outside-the-lines guy, just sort of conform because they can’t handle the pressure if it doesn’t work,” said one former assistant coach. “But Lane would color outside the lines, and if two things worked and two things didn’t work, it wouldn’t faze him mentally.”
One of the areas where Kiffin and Saban clashed most often that first season came on resting players, especially during practice, and cutting down on their reps later in the season.
“I didn’t win many of those battles,” Kiffin said. “Maybe the only one was with Amari Cooper. He was like a running back that year. He caught 124 passes [a school record]. I just wanted to make sure he still had his legs at the end of the season.”
Saban admits that he’s old-school, but not to the point of being stubborn.
“I’m old-school when it comes to doing things right and being disciplined, all that,” Saban said. “I’m not old-school in the technical aspects of playing the game. There are differences, and I don’t think people get that sometimes.
“So I do listen. I listen a lot, listened to Lane [on Cooper]. That’s how you learn. Now, there are some things I’m just not willing to compromise.”
While there might have been some concession on Cooper and his reps that season, a coach on that staff said Saban is unwavering when it comes to practice.
“That wasn’t going to change, and it hasn’t changed,” the coach said. “And anybody who tells you it has changed is lying. The process is the process, and the way [Saban] develops his football team with practice reps is not changing. It wasn’t Lane’s call. It wasn’t my call. It was Coach Saban’s call.
“Now, do you have the ability to get him to expand what his intent is? Yes. Lane got him to expand his thinking on certain things. But change? No.”
In retrospect, Kiffin admits he might have pressed too hard, too fast, on some things.
“Like a lot of people do with a previous marriage, I look back on my time now with Coach Saban differently,” Kiffin said. “I could have done much better with just, ‘Yes sir,’ no matter what he said. That’s the majority of that building. They say, ‘Yes sir,’ no matter what. I guess my issue was that I wasn’t trained that way. I’d been a head coach and an assistant coach to Pete Carroll for six years. Pete Carroll was not a ‘yes sir’ environment at all. It was more, ‘Bring up whatever ideas you want.'”
The two coaches stood at midfield inside Vaught-Hemingway Stadium after one of the most exciting games last season, Kiffin wearing an Ole Miss powder blue face covering and shaking hands with his former boss, Saban, who was decked out in head-to-toe Alabama gear.
For three-and-a-half quarters, they’d gone back and forth in an old fashioned shootout. The final score: Alabama 63, Ole Miss 48.
“That damn Lane, he said it after they played us last year: ‘Everything I told him for three years, he wrote it down,'” Saban would later say. “He said after the game, ‘I did every one of those things in the game.’
“He had a whole notepad of s— that I said was a problem to defend when we were together, and he said, ‘I did every one of them.'”
The two teams combined for an SEC-record 1,370 yards, and the 647 yards the Rebels churned out were the most ever against the Tide.
It was a brand of football that would have been unrecognizable to Saban and Kiffin when they first joined up.
“We used to recruit against Alabama at USC and Tennessee and would say, ‘You’re a great quarterback. Don’t go there. You’ll be a game manager. You’ll never put up big numbers,'” Kiffin said. “If you were a receiver, we would tell them not to go there. Here’s Julio Jones, one of the greatest of all time, and he never had more than 78 catches, but yet, Amari Cooper had 124.”
In Kiffin’s three years in Tuscaloosa, the Tide went 40-4 with three College Football Playoff appearances and one national title.
Of course, Kiffin didn’t make it to Alabama’s national title game that third year, having been dismissed by Saban earlier in the week. Kiffin had taken the head job with Florida Atlantic, and Saban felt he wasn’t paying enough attention to his Alabama job after the Tide scored just two offensive touchdowns and freshman quarterback Jalen Hurts threw for just 57 yards in a 24-7 national semifinal win over Washington.
“You look back and see where you were at fault and what I could have done better,” Kiffin said. “Now I find myself, which is like a kid saying and doing the same things his parents did, sounding a lot like Coach Saban.”
When Kiffin left, Alabama’s offense only got scarier under future offensive coordinators Mike Locksley and Sarkisian. The program produced first-round quarterbacks like Tua Tagovailoa and Mac Jones, who put up record-setting numbers when throwing to game-breaking, first-round receivers like Jerry Jeudy, Henry Ruggs III, Jaylen Waddle and last year’s Heisman winner, DeVonta Smith.
As one longtime staffer said, “There’s a narrative out there that the Alabama offense exploded under Lane, and he was a big part of where it is now. But the explosion came under Locks and Sark. Just look at the numbers over the last few years.”
Alabama has finished in the top three in scoring offense each of the past three years and sixth or better in both total offense and passing offense the past three years. Of course, it has done it with three straight quarterbacks drafted in the first round and nine running backs, receivers or tight ends selected in the first three rounds of the past four drafts.
Most in and around the program at that time also agree that Kiffin’s offenses helped to attract more elite skill people.
“I do feel like the numbers we put up and what we started to do on offense made it more attractive for offensive skill players to come from all over the country because they always got great defensive players,” Kiffin said.
Just look at Alabama’s current quarterback: Bryce Young, a former five-star prospect from California. Young’s father said they didn’t take Alabama seriously as a destination until they saw the offense begin to open up with Tagovailoa at quarterback. Young’s top receivers are John Metchie III, who is from Canada, and Jameson Williams, a Missouri native who transferred from Ohio State.
Kiffin enters Saturday’s matchup with another another California quarterback, Matt Corral, who is lighting up the scoreboards with 14 touchdowns in three games and is the new Heisman front-runner.
Ole Miss leads the country in scoring offense (52.7 points per game) and total offense (638.3 yards per game), while Alabama isn’t far behind with 46.5 points per game.
And now Kiffin has a chance to make good on an old promise when he returns to Tuscaloosa for the first time as an opposing head coach since 2009, his lone year at Tennessee. After the Vols pushed the Tide to the brink before losing, 12-10, the cocky young Kiffin met Saban at midfield.
“Good game, but we’ll get you the next time.”
For Mike Sullivan, the latest coach of the New York Rangers, there will be many priorities in taking over a team that missed the playoffs a season after winning the Presidents’ Trophy.
Foremost will be communication.
“I have spoken to every player on the roster over the last three days,” Sullivan said Thursday at his introductory news conference. “I think there is a fair amount of leadership in that room. There’s a lot of character in that room.”
Sullivan, the 38th coach in franchise history and fifth since 2018, agreed to lead the Rangers on May 2 after parting ways with Pittsburgh, with whom he won the Stanley Cup twice.
He replaces Peter Laviolette, who was fired April 19 after the Rangers slid 29 points to miss the postseason despite their raft of talent. It will be up to Sullivan to resuscitate a power play that fell from the league’s top echelon to 28th overall in 2024-25 and help the defense improve in front of elite goaltender Igor Shesterkin, who is coming off his worst NHL season.
Sullivan spent four seasons as a Rangers assistant under then-coach John Tortorella from 2009 to 2013. He also coached current Rangers president and general manager Chris Drury during that time. They also worked together through USA Hockey at the 4 Nations Face-Off in February and will be part of the U.S. contingent for the 2026 Milan Olympics.
Sullivan will have top scorers Artemi Panarin, Mika Zibanejad and Adam Fox on his side after years guiding Penguins stars Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang in Pittsburgh, where he won the Cup in 2016 and 2017.
“I’ve grown so much respect over the years for the talent that the Rangers have,” said Sullivan, who lost a seven-game first-round playoff series to the Rangers in 2022. “I look forward to the opportunity to get to know these guys on a more personal level. I look forward to the opportunity to work with them, both on the ice and off the ice, to try to become the most competitive team that we can become.”
Also pressing for the 57-year-old Sullivan — who was drafted by the Rangers in 1987 and later played 709 NHL games for four other franchises — is how he will handle younger Rangers such as 22-year-old Brennan Othmann and 20-year-old Gabe Perreault, a first-round pick in 2023 who joined the team briefly at the end of last season.
“Part of coaching or the art of coaching, I guess, is trying to figure out what that daily recipe is that’s best for the player,” Sullivan said. “Sometimes it’s time in the American League as a young player, sometimes it’s time in the National League depending on the types of minutes that that player can play. What I will tell you is that I think it’s important that every player earns their opportunities, that no one’s entitled to an opportunity.”
Sullivan was joined Thursday by Drury, who was awarded a contract extension last month.
Drury’s previous two coaching hires — Laviolette and Gerard Gallant — each lasted two seasons. The 48-year-old executive expressed enthusiasm for the addition of Sullivan, the only U.S.-born coach with multiple Stanley Cup wins.
“The second Mike was available, we quickly and aggressively pursued him,” Drury said. “We are certainly thrilled that pursuit led us to this moment today. There’s a lot of work to be done.”
The battle between National League powerhouses for the No. 1 spot continues in Week 6.
The Dodgers, Mets and Padres are still duking it out for the title of best team in baseball, with Los Angeles retaking the top spot from New York on our list. The top five is rounded out by a new team, as well, with the Tigers breaking in at the No. 5 spot.
Detroit is the top American League team this week, with the Yankees coming in at No. 7, the Mariners cracking the top 10 and the Royals, the week’s biggest risers, at No. 11.
What else has changed in the span of one week?
Our expert panel has combined to rank every team based on a combination of what we’ve seen so far and what we already knew going into the 162-game marathon that is a full baseball season. We also asked ESPN MLB experts David Schoenfield, Jorge Castillo and Bradford Doolittle to weigh in with an observation for all 30 teams.
Record: 25-12
Previous ranking: 2
The Dodgers are suddenly scrambling in the outfield. Teoscar Hernandez was tied for the MLB lead in RBIs when he landed on the injured list because of a groin strain that manager Dave Roberts said would keep Hernandez out for “weeks.” James Outman replaced Hernandez on the roster and started in center field Tuesday with Andy Pages sliding over to right. Meanwhile, Michael Conforto continues to struggle. With Tommy Edman also out, Roberts says he sees a lot of platooning in the short term. At least Shohei Ohtani and Freddie Freeman are both red-hot to carry the offense. — Schoenfield
Record: 24-14
Previous ranking: 1
When the Mets signed ex-Yankee Clay Holmes this past winter, it was a mild surprise. The bigger surprise was that he was inked to join the rotation. Holmes entered the 2025 season with four career starts, all during his debut season for Pittsburgh in 2018 — whereas he has played a relief role in 307 games over eight MLB seasons. Seven starts into his Mets career, Holmes looks like a bona fide rotation fixture. He’s 4-1 with a 2.95 ERA and 2.18 FIP. His strikeout and walk ratios are matches for what he posted last season as a reliever, and he has yet to give up a homer to 156 batters faced. — Doolittle
Record: 23-13
Previous ranking: 4
Michael King and Nick Pivetta continue to team for one of the best duos in the majors, going a combined 9-2 with a 2.12 ERA. King returned to the Bronx — where he played for the Yankees for four seasons — and pitched another gem Tuesday, giving up three hits and two runs in six innings (although the Padres’ bullpen had a rare meltdown and proceeded to give up 10 runs in the seventh inning). After a poor outing on Opening Day, King has a 1.71 ERA over his past seven starts. — Schoenfield
Record: 22-16
Previous ranking: 5
The Cubs’ offense has been a force, but the team is facing adversity among its starting pitchers. First, Justin Steele needed Tommy John surgery and was lost for the season. Then Javier Assad, out because of an oblique strain to begin the season, sustained another oblique strain during a rehab start and was shut down. Finally, on Monday, Shota Imanaga was put on the IL because of a strained hamstring. The Cubs haven’t provided a timetable for Imanaga’s return. It’ll be on Matthew Boyd (2.75 ERA), Colin Rea (2.43 ERA) and Jameson Taillon (3.86 ERA) to hold down the rotation for now. — Castillo
Record: 23-13
Previous ranking: 7
The Tigers have flourished in a number of ways during the season’s opening weeks but one thing that really stands out is the degree to which they have dominated at Comerica Park. They’ve started 13-3 at home with a net per-game differential of plus-2.81 runs, the best in baseball. To put it another way, that differential translates to an .819 expected winning percentage, or 133 wins over 162 games. Not unrelated: Detroit has also moved into the early lead in the chase for the AL’s top postseason seed, which of course carries with it home-field advantage in October. — Doolittle
Record: 24-14
Previous ranking: 6
Logan Webb just keeps rolling along as one of the most underrated starters in MLB. He led the majors in innings pitched in 2023, ranked second in 2024 and again ranks among the league leaders this season. He has given up only one home run in 48⅓ innings and is producing a career-high strikeout rate (up eight percentage points from last season). He has used his sweeper more this year, but his changeup has been much more effective than it was in 2024, perhaps because he’s throwing it less often. — Schoenfield
Record: 21-16
Previous ranking: 3
Max Fried has been exceptional as a Yankee, posting a 1.05 ERA through eight starts. Carlos Rodón has rebounded from a choppy early stretch and sports a 2.96 ERA in eight outings. Outside of those two, the Yankees’ rotation is iffy at best without Gerrit Cole and Luis Gil. Clarke Schmidt recorded his best start of the season Tuesday against the Padres after dealing with injuries. Will Warren has a 5.65 ERA. Carlos Carrasco was designated for assignment. Marcus Stroman is out indefinitely. While Gil is progressing in his recovery from a lat strain, the Yankees need Fried and Rodón to continue registering quality starts. — Castillo
Record: 21-15
Previous ranking: 8
Bryce Harper‘s homer during the Phillies’ wild 11-9 loss to Arizona on Tuesday ended a 13-game long-ball drought. That’s far from Harper’s longest homerless streak — he went 38 games without one in 2023 — but it still highlighted an uneven start for Philly’s marquee player. Harper has started every game thus far for manager Rob Thomson. Does he need a rest? Should the Phils be worried? Probably not. Harper’s BABIP has cratered but that’s one indicator that tends to regress to career norms. His power numbers are down but, per Statcast, his bat speed is actually up from 2024. He’ll be fine. — Doolittle
Record: 22-14
Previous ranking: 11
And finally Cal Raleigh rested … almost. Raleigh had started the first 34 games of the season, either at catcher or DH. His two-homer, five-RBI game Saturday against the Rangers helped power the Mariners to their eighth consecutive series victory. Against the Athletics on Tuesday, Raleigh was on the bench … until the ninth inning. Trailing 3-2 with the bases loaded and one out, Raleigh pinch hit for Mitch Garver and delivered a go-ahead two-run single in a 5-3 victory. His 12 home runs are tied with Aaron Judge and Kyle Schwarber for the MLB lead. — Schoenfield
Record: 19-18
Previous ranking: 9
Geraldo Perdomo continues to rake, including a 4-for-5 game with two doubles and three RBIs in Sunday’s wild 11-9 win over the Phillies. Perdomo has more walks than strikeouts, is 9-for-9 stealing bases, has a 99th percentile ranking in outs above average at shortstop and has already produced 2.2 fWAR compared to 2.0 all of 2024. That figure puts him in a five-way tie for the third-highest fWAR — behind only Aaron Judge and Pete Alonso. — Schoenfield
Record: 22-16
Previous ranking: 19
The Royals’ offense has been moving in the right direction, aiding a recent torrid stretch that was driven by elite run prevention. Bobby Witt Jr. has produced all along but, as good as he is, he can’t do it alone. Help has arrived in the form of Maikel Garcia, whose surge has brought his season numbers into lockstep with Witt. Garcia’s swing decisions have improved by leaps and bounds, lowering his already-solid strikeout rate and lifting his walk rate well over league average. Garcia, who has started at four different positions, will merit All-Star consideration if he maintains this pace. — Doolittle
Record: 19-19
Previous ranking: 10
Boston received a huge blow over the weekend, losing Triston Casas for the season because of a ruptured patellar tendon. Now the Red Sox have to figure out who will play first base. The current answer is a combination of Romy Gonzalez and Abraham Toro, but that probably isn’t permanent — and Gonzalez exited Wednesday night’s win after a collision on the base path and is day-to-day. Boston could move Rafael Devers to first base and have Masataka Yoshida, who hasn’t played this season because a shoulder injury is inhibiting his ability to throw, as its DH. The Red Sox could shift rookie Kristian Campbell from second base. They could seek external help. They could even call up one of their top two prospects, Roman Anthony or Marcelo Mayer, to play first. They have options. — Castillo
Record: 22-15
Previous ranking: 16
The Guardians have stayed afloat in the standings thanks to a spate of comeback wins and one-run victories. Eventually they’ll need some of their underperforming positions to produce. Steven Kwan has arguably been the best at his position in left field but his outfield partners have collectively been among the worst. Right fielder Jhonkensy Noel has sputtered along with a sub-.500 OPS while, in center, Opening Day starter Lane Thomas had an OPS under .400 before hitting the IL because of a bruised wrist. Cleveland needs numbers from both before the close-game luck begins to run out. — Doolittle
Record: 17-19
Previous ranking: 13
As a group, the Braves’ outfield ranks in the bottom five by wins above average. The fixes: get Ronald Acuña Jr. back, get Michael Harris II going and navigate the weeks until Jurickson Profar returns from suspension. On the latter front, a promising left-field platoon might be taking shape in Alex Verdugo and Eli White. For now, both are needed to man the outfield corners, but that will change when Acuña returns. At the plate, Verdugo has a career .783 OPS against righties; meanwhile, after struggling early in his career against southpaws, White has crushed them in limited time the past two seasons. — Doolittle
Record: 19-19
Previous ranking: 14
The Reds’ season continues to be strange. Their plus-30 run differential ranks eighth in the majors and suggests a 22-16 record. Instead, they remain tethered to .500 territory. The offense’s inconsistency is the main culprit. After scoring 22 runs in a three-game sweep of the Rockies in Denver, Cincinnati tallied three or fewer runs in six of their next nine games. Jose Trevino and Gavin Lux have been crucial contributors in their first seasons in Cincinnati, but the Reds need more from Elly De La Cruz, one of the sport’s most dynamic talents who has been about a league-average hitter so far. — Castillo
Record: 18-18
Previous ranking: 12
As the Astros struggle to score runs, it won’t help that Yordan Alvarez landed on the IL because of hand inflammation. The All-Star slugger was already off to the worst start of his career, hitting .210/.306/.340 with only three home runs and seven extra-base hits in 29 games, when he was scratched from Saturday’s lineup and then didn’t play Sunday before the Astros finally put him on the IL. Alvarez isn’t the only Astros hitter struggling as Yainer Diaz and Christian Walker have sub-.300 OBPs, and Jose Altuve is scuffling with sub-100 OPS+, his lowest since 2013. — Schoenfield
Record: 19-19
Previous ranking: 18
Joey Ortiz, acquired before last season in the trade for Corbin Burnes, put together a 3.1 fWAR rookie campaign in 2024, hitting 11 home runs with a 104 wRC+ and good defense at third base. That’s what makes his production in 2025 so shocking. Now playing shortstop as Willy Adames’ replacement, Ortiz has compiled -0.6 fWAR in 37 games this season. He’s batting .175 without a home run and a .206 slugging percentage. His 27 wRC+ ranks 160th out of 161 qualified players and has hampered the offense, which as a whole has a 90 wRC+, the seventh-lowest mark in the majors. — Castillo
Record: 20-18
Previous ranking: 20
The A’s got to within one game of first place and had a chance to tie Seattle on Tuesday but blew a ninth-inning lead. It was the second blown save in four games for the A’s. On Saturday, Mason Miller had a rare bad outing, serving up a walk-off grand slam to Miami’s Kyle Stowers. With Miller unavailable Tuesday after throwing 55 pitches over three days, Tyler Ferguson came on for the save — his fourth appearance in four days — and gave up a 3-2 lead. It was the first time an A’s pitcher threw four days in a row since 2015. — Schoenfield
Record: 18-19
Previous ranking: 15
Looking to turn around a moribund offense, the Rangers hired former All-Star Bret Boone as the team’s hitting coach, while firing offensive coordinator Donnie Ecker. At the time of the move, the Rangers ranked 25th in the majors in batting average, 25th in slugging and 29th in both runs and walk rate. Previous hitting coach Justin Viele and assistant hitting coach Seth Conner remain on staff. Texas then erupted for 16 hits Tuesday in Boone’s first game, winning consecutive games for the first time since April 17. Evan Carter returned to the majors and went 2-for-5. — Schoenfield
Record: 16-20
Previous ranking: 17
Steinbrenner Field has not been very kind to the Rays so far. They’re 9-15 in their temporary digs and 7-5 elsewhere. The stadium has played as expected, as a hitters’ haven. Opponents have taken better advantage of that with 35 home runs and a .256/.313/.418 slash line. Meanwhile, the Rays have hit 22 home runs at home. They’re built to win games with pitching and defense. That combination so far hasn’t been suited for Steinbrenner Field. — Castillo
Record: 16-20
Previous ranking: 22
The Blue Jays made four major offseason acquisitions. Three — Anthony Santander, Andres Gimenez and Max Scherzer — have been colossal disappointments. Santander has a 75 wRC+ as the team’s primary DH. Gimenez is a defense-first second baseman, but he began the year as the team’s cleanup hitter and has a 68 wRC+. Scherzer has thrown three innings. But Jeff Hoffman has established himself as one of the top closers in baseball after two teams nixed agreements with him during the winter due to concerns about his shoulder health. The right-hander gave up two runs over his first 14 appearances, recording a 1.10 ERA, until his three-run hiccup Tuesday against the Angels. — Castillo
Record: 17-20
Previous ranking: 21
A Twins offense that has floundered for much of the season received a much-needed boost when oft-injured Royce Lewis finally made his season debut. Lewis went down because of a hamstring strain in mid-March and sat out the first five-plus weeks. That was nothing new for a talented player whose career high in games is 82. When he has played, he has produced, posting a 124 career OPS+ with 35 homers and 110 RBIs per 162 games played. Now that Lewis is back, the spotlight falls on shortstop Carlos Correa, who continues to limp along with career-worst percentages. — Doolittle
Record: 19-19
Previous ranking: 24
By most metrics, the Cardinals have by far deployed the best defense in baseball. In the middle of it is center fielder Victor Scott II. Coming off a disastrous rookie season in 2024, in which he posted a 40 OPS+ in 53 games, Scott is thriving as a contact-first speedster with elite defense at a premium position. He’s tied for fourth in the majors in defensive runs saved and outs above average while batting .289 with 11 steals in 12 attempts. At 24, Scott is solidifying himself as a centerpiece of the Cardinals’ rebuild. — Castillo
Record: 17-21
Previous ranking: 25
In the middle of April, the Nationals’ bullpen performance was so off-the-charts bad that manager Dave Martinez called a meeting in his office just to address the relievers. Did it work? At the time, their relief ERA was an astounding 7.21. Three weeks later, that number is … 7.22. The irony is that closer Kyle Finnegan, who was non-tendered by Washington last fall before signing back late in the offseason, has been pretty good (3.07 ERA over 15 appearances with 12 saves in 14 chances). That tells you a little about how badly the rest of the bullpen has struggled. — Doolittle
Record: 13-22
Previous ranking: 23
General manager Mike Elias took blame for the team’s ghastly start and voiced his support for manager Brandon Hyde last Friday. Elias’ offseason decision-making and the subsequent injuries have tanked the starting rotation, but the vaunted offense isn’t doing its part. Cedric Mullins, Jackson Holliday and Ryan O’Hearn have been bright spots, but Adley Rutschman, Ryan Mountcastle, Heston Kjerstad and Jordan Westburg all have an OPS+ under 100. Gunnar Henderson, slowed by an intercostal strain to begin the season, isn’t playing like the MVP candidate he was in 2024. Tyler O’Neill is on the IL again. Baltimore ranks 23rd in runs scored and that isn’t good enough to overcome the rotation’s warts. — Castillo
Record: 12-26
Previous ranking: 28
It has been a disastrous season for the Pirates, on and off the field. There was the controversy surrounding the franchise’s decision to replace a Roberto Clemente logo with a hard iced tea ad at PNC Park. Last week, a fan broke his neck, clavicle and back when he fell from the 21-foot-high Clemente Wall onto the field. This week, a video of a PNC Park usher fighting a fan went viral. On the field, the Pirates are in last place in the NL Central again with one of the worst offenses in the majors. — Castillo
Record: 14-22
Previous ranking: 27
The Marlins have been competitive in some facets this season, but the area that decidedly does not fit that bill has been a glaringly awful starting rotation. Miami’s 6.35 rotation ERA ranks ahead of only the 6-29 Rockies. The Marlins have always been built on strong rotations when they’ve been good — but in 2025, they’ve produced only five quality starts in 36 games. Surely their starter ERA will move in the right direction from here (right?), but if it doesn’t, the franchise nadir (a 5.58 rotation ERA in 2007) could be in jeopardy. — Doolittle
Record: 15-20
Previous ranking: 26
Part of the problem with the slumping Angels: a defense that ranks second worst in the majors in defensive runs saved (ahead of only the A’s). Catcher Logan O’Hoppe, first baseman Nolan Schanuel and third baseman Luis Rengifo all rank as the worst at their positions via defensive runs saved. Schanuel and Rengifo also rank near the bottom in Statcast’s outs above average, as does center fielder Jo Adell. (Kyren Paris has been getting more time there of late.) The Angels back up that bad defense with the worst team OBP in the majors. — Schoenfield
Record: 10-27
Previous ranking: 29
The White Sox aren’t what analysts would label as “good,” but their record would be less terrible if not for an amazing 2-10 start in one-run games. Five of the losses were last-inning road defeats, including Tuesday’s debacle that featured rookie Chase Meidroth getting bonked on the head by a routine pop-up. Chicago’s saves leader is Brandon Eisert — with one. That’s right: After six weeks of the season, the White Sox have recorded exactly one save. The late-game failings undermine a club that, by and large, has cleared the low bar of playing better than it did in 2024. — Doolittle
Record: 6-29
Previous ranking: 30
The Rockies actually won two games in a row last week, beating the Braves 2-1 behind a solid outing from Chase Dollander and then beating the Giants 4-3 with two runs in the eighth inning. Alas, the losing picked right back up and the Rockies’ wRC+ fell to 64 (100 is average). The MLB low since 1901 is 68 (by the 1920 Philadelphia A’s) and even last year’s woeful White Sox came in at 75. So, yes, we’re looking at one of the worst offenses of all time. — Schoenfield
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Alden Gonzalez
We’re six weeks into the 2025 MLB season, long enough to gather some meaningful intel but short enough to wonder how much of it actually matters.
Pete Alonso has gone from unwanted free agent to MVP front-runner, only one team in the typically mighty American League East boasts a winning record, and some of the game’s best closers — Devin Williams, Alexis Díaz, Ryan Pressly and Emmanuel Clase, in particular — are suddenly not.
Those are just a few of the notable surprises through the first 23% or so of this season. Below are five others, and the reasons behind them.
Spencer Torkelson is suddenly hitting like a No. 1 pick
Spencer Torkelson was the Detroit Tigers’ No. 1 draft pick out of Arizona State University in 2020, billed as a can’t-miss bat. The 2024 season was supposed to be the stage for his breakout. Instead, he found himself back in the minor leagues.
Tigers manager A.J. Hinch texted Torkelson almost daily after the team sent him down to Triple-A in June. At one point, the two even met up for breakfast. Hinch wanted to assure Torkelson that the Tigers were thinking about him and still valued him. But what Torkelson might have needed most, some of those around him believe, was to see the team succeed without him. He needed the urgency to change.
“Coming out of college, I felt like I had it figured out, was the greatest hitter ever,” Torkelson said. “And I got humbled.”
Torkelson struggled so profoundly last year — a .669 OPS, 10 homers and 105 strikeouts in 92 games — that he entered 2025 without a clear path for playing time. Now, early in his age-25 season, he looks like the feared hitter so many expected to see. Through 36 games, Torkelson has already equaled last year’s home run total. He’s drawing walks at a significantly higher rate, OPS’ing .879 and ranking within the top 5% in expected slugging percentage — a stat in which he finished 211th among 252 hitters last year.
Torkelson entered this season with a 361-game sample of inconsistency, but scouts don’t see his sudden success as an early-season fluke — they see it as the result of an elite hitter making consequential adjustments.
Torkelson is more athletic and in rhythm in his stance this year, whereas previously he looked “statuesque,” in the words of one Tigers source. He has more bend in his knees, plants his feet closer together and has implemented a slight crouch. But it’s not really a change. It’s how he hit right up until the time he reached the majors.
“You watch any swing in my entire life,” Torkelson said, “I kinda look exactly the way I look right now.”
The taller stance Torkelson fell into at the big league level was what he described as “a Band-Aid.” The high fastball gave him trouble early on, so Torkelson did what felt obvious: make that high fastball seem less high.
“And it worked,” Torkelson said. “I got away with it. I hit 31 homers and I didn’t even feel that great.”
But those 31 home runs, accumulated in his second year in 2023, masked other deficiencies that showed up the following summer. Torkelson slashed just .205/.271/.337 through the end of May in 2024. Shortly after, he was sent back to Triple-A for what became an 11-week stint. He returned in mid-August, produced a more respectable .781 OPS over his last 38 regular-season games, then went into the offseason vowing to hit the way he used to. He took a lesson from studying one of his favorite hitters, Mike Trout, who has built a Hall of Fame career despite struggling against the high fastball.
“We don’t get paid to hammer the high fastball,” Torkelson said. “We get paid to hammer the mistakes.”
The Tigers signed veteran second baseman Gleyber Torres to a one-year, $15 million deal in late December, then announced Colt Keith would move to first base. Torkelson came into spring training having to fight just to get at-bats at designated hitter.
Then everything changed. Torkelson hit his way into a starting role at first base in 31 of the Tigers’ 36 games. His production — along with that of Javier Baez, who has produced an .827 OPS while transitioning to center field — has given the Tigers some much-needed right-handed power and helped them climb to the top of the AL Central.
“I’m seeing the ball better, and I feel dangerous at the plate,” Torkelson said. “As a hitter, that’s all you can ask for. You’re not going to hit 1.000. But when you’re feeling dangerous and you’re seeing the ball well, you feel like you can’t be beat. You’re going to get beat, but it gives you the best shot.”
The Angels’ lineup is trending toward the worst type of history
Last year, the lowly offenses of the Colorado Rockies and Chicago White Sox posted two of the 12 worst walk-to-strikeout ratios in major league history. Now the Los Angeles Angels, who entered 2025 with hopes of finally being competitive again, are making an early run at the all-time mark.
The Angels’ offense has accumulated 81 walks through its first 35 games this season, the lowest total in the majors. Their hitters have struck out 338 times (third most). Before tying their season high with six walks in a walk-off win on Wednesday night, their 0.23 walk-to-strikeout rate was on pace to be the worst in baseball history. It has since improved to a mere 0.24, tied with the 2019 White Sox for the lowest ever.
It’s probably not surprising to learn that the full-season bottom 10 in that category has taken place over the past dozen years, at a time when hitters strike out more often than ever. It’s probably also not surprising to learn that seven of those 10 teams lost at least 100 games.
The Angels’ offense has been that bad. Since putting up 11 runs at the spring training facility where the Tampa Bay Rays play on April 10, they rank 29th in batting average, 27th in slugging percentage, and last in each of the following categories: on-base percentage, strikeout rate, walk rate and runs per game.
And though there’s still plenty of time to turn this around, it’s hard to envision how that historically low walk-to-strikeout rate — an important barometer of success on both sides — significantly improves. (Their pitching strikeout-to-walk rate, ranked 27th at 1.90, isn’t much better.)
On Tuesday, the Angels were happy to welcome back Yoan Moncada, who is capable of drawing walks but also strikes out at an exceedingly high rate. A return from Mike Trout, whose latest knee injury is not considered serious, would certainly help, though he reached base at only a .264 clip during his first 29 games. Taylor Ward, meanwhile, is much better than a .180/.225/.376 hitter.
But then there’s Jo Adell, whose career .639 OPS ranks 100th among the 114 players in Angels history with at least 1,000 plate appearances. And Logan O’Hoppe, who had the fifth-highest strikeout rate in the majors last year. And Jorge Soler, a prodigious power hitter who naturally carries a lot of swing-and-miss. And, notably, Kyren Paris, who looked like a breakout star early on but lately looks overmatched; since a two-hit game put his OPS at 1.514 on April 11, Paris has eight hits, three walks and 32 strikeouts in 66 plate appearances.
The Angels’ coaches have been trying to emphasize a two-strike approach with their hitters, but there’s only so much they can do.
“When you’ve got guys that’s capable of hitting the ball out the ballpark, it’s hard to tell them to cut their swing down because they don’t know what that is,” Angels manager Ron Washington said. “And when you’ve got guys in the lineup that don’t have a lot of experience and you say, ‘Cut the swing down,’ they don’t know what that is. There’s a lot of baseball to be gathered around here, man.”
Washington paused for a moment and smiled. Before being hired by the Angels in November 2023, Washington spent seven years as the third-base coach and infield instructor on Atlanta Braves teams brimming with veteran, championship-caliber players. This Angels team is not that. It’s young and inexperienced, and Washington has to remind himself of that constantly.
He is a teacher at heart, and often that requires patience. His is being tested like never before.
The Brewers’ injury-riddled rotation has somehow found a way
Three Milwaukee Brewers starting pitchers — DL Hall, Tobias Myers and Aaron Ashby — landed on the injured list with soft-tissue injuries during spring training. Two more, Aaron Civale and Nestor Cortes, went on the shelf within the regular season’s first week. By that point, the list of starting pitchers on the IL stretched to seven. And yet, in the most Brewers way possible, their rotation followed with a miraculous run.
From April 6-22, the foursome of Freddy Peralta, Chad Patrick, Jose Quintana and Quinn Priester combined for a 1.55 ERA over 63⅔ innings. The Brewers began the season by allowing 47 runs in 33 innings, but since then, their starting rotation boasts the fifth-lowest ERA in the majors at 3.08.
Peralta is a bona fide top-of-the-rotation starter, but Quintana is a 36-year-old who signed for a mere $4 million in March; Priester is a failed first-round pick acquired in a minor trade early last month; and Patrick is a 26-year-old rookie who wasn’t on anybody’s radar when the season began.
But the Brewers have built a reputation for employing pitchers who overachieve. Because they can’t afford the high-ceiling arms who cost a fortune in free agency, they hammer their depth to raise their floor as much as possible. And to do so, they apply a simple concept: develop and acquire pitchers who fit their environment. More specifically, pitchers who benefit most from a strong infield defense.
Quintana, who can throw his sinker with more conviction with better defense behind him, posted a 1.14 ERA in his first four starts before allowing six runs to the Chicago Cubs on Saturday. Patrick, who boasts an elite cutter with two different shapes, has a 3.08 ERA in his first seven turns through the rotation. Priester, the 18th pick in 2019, had a 6.23 ERA in 99⅔ major league innings heading into 2025. But the Brewers were intrigued by a minor league track record in which he had roughly average strikeout and walk rates and kept more than half the batted balls against him on the ground. Priester maintained a 1.93 ERA through his first three starts before allowing 12 runs over his next 9⅓ innings.
That rough patch aside, Priester helped stabilize a Brewers rotation that was in dire straits when the season began. A key reinforcement could come by the end of this week, when Brandon Woodruff makes his long-awaited return from shoulder surgery. Woodruff has been fully healthy, pitching without restrictions, but his velocity has been down, his fastball sitting in the 92- to 94-mph range as opposed to the upper-90s heat he featured while pitching like an ace. When Woodruff returns, he might have to pitch differently.
The Brewers will probably figure it out.
The next hitting star on the Rays is actually … Jonathan Aranda?
The Tampa Bay Rays exceeded their international bonus pool in 2014, restricting them to signing players for no more than $300,000 over the next two years. And yet, leading up to the 2015 signing period, assistant general manager Carlos Rodríguez and then-international scouting supervisor Eddie Díaz traveled to Tijuana, Mexico, to watch a Cuban outfielder they could not afford: Randy Arozarena.
The trip proved to be beneficial years later, when the Rays acquired Arozarena from the St. Louis Cardinals and helped him become a star. But it was beneficial for another reason: It helped them discover Jonathan Aranda.
Rodríguez, at that time the director of Latin American scouting, asked Díaz to line up other prospects to see during the trip. Aranda was in that group and caught their eye. The Rays signed him for $130,000 in July 2015. Ten years later, they’re watching him blossom.
Aranda, a 26-year-old left-handed hitter, ranks third with 182 weighted runs created plus this season, behind only Aaron Judge and Alonso. He’s slashing .317/.417/.554 with 14 extra-base hits. And so far, at least, he’s stealing the spotlight from Junior Caminero, widely hailed as the Rays’ next hitting phenom. It’s easy to be skeptical — Aranda’s .971 OPS is 279 points higher than his career mark in 110 games going into 2025 — but those who know him best are adamant that this is real.
Aranda has always been an elite hitter. The question was how the Rays would fit him into their major league roster. He came up as a shortstop at around the same time Wander Franco surged through the system. By the time he was on the cusp of the major leagues, the likes of Yandy Diaz, Isaac Paredes, Brandon Lowe and Ji-man Choi occupied the other infield positions.
At one point, the Rays had Aranda try catching in hopes of getting his bat to the big leagues quicker. They felt he might have the arm and the hands for it. Aranda went back to Mexico and caught a handful of bullpen sessions but decided against it. He expressed confidence that his bat would eventually be enough to reach the majors.
It looked like it would in 2024. Aranda slashed .371/.421/.571 in 13 Grapefruit League games that spring and was primed to crack the Opening Day roster. But then he broke his right ring finger fielding a grounder, missed about five weeks and struggled for most of the ensuing season. It prompted a stint in winter ball, where he made small mechanical tweaks that have helped him thrive in the early part of 2025.
But mostly, Rays officials believe, Aranda’s success stems from finally having a pathway for consistent playing time, largely as the stronger half of a DH platoon. His splits are quite drastic — 1.066 OPS against righties, three hits in 18 at-bats against lefties — but Aranda profiles as a 20-plus home run hitter who can rack up doubles and control the strike zone. It just took him a bit to get there.
Max Muncy suddenly can’t hit home runs
Max Muncy went 106 plate appearances before finally hitting his first home run of 2025 on the final day of April. It marked the longest single-season homerless streak of his career, easily topping the 80-plate-appearance rut from 2022, according to ESPN Research.
His biggest issue was one that plagues many left-handed hitters who throw right-handed.
“He gets out on his front side pretty quickly,” Dodgers hitting coach Aaron Bates explained. “Part of the challenge for him is when he needs to start his leg kick and how to maintain balance as he’s striding forward. Because he throws with his right hand and hits lefty, the right side of his body kind of dominates his swing moving toward the pitcher, which is pretty common for a lot of guys. You look at Corey Seager, he’s pretty balanced. But a lot of times, when you have a lefty-righty-combo guy, they get kind of pulled that way. So that’s something that he has to constantly battle, and he has his whole career. When he’s synced up and he’s right, it’s great. And when he’s out of whack, he’s got to work to get it right.”
Muncy spent the better part of the first month working to sync up his timing, specifically when he drives his momentum forward. Few major league hitters stay on their back side through their entire load, Aaron Judge being a notable exception. But for most of this season, Muncy was getting to his front side too early, which resulted in fouling off hittable fastballs and struggling against breaking pitches.
“When you don’t trust yourself as a hitter, you don’t wanna get beat, and so you get off your backside sooner,” Bates said. “So it’s like the chicken or the egg.”
When Muncy settled into the batter’s box in the second inning on April 30, 305 players had already homered in the major leagues this season. Muncy, with four 35-plus-homer seasons on his résumé, was not one of them. That day, he debuted prescription eyeglasses he had been testing out during pregame workouts to combat astigmatism in his right eye. The hope, Muncy told reporters, was that the glasses would make him less left-eye dominant.
But the biggest issue was a swing he had tweaked to produce low line drives instead of fly balls but wound up making him drift forward too early. Getting his weight shift back to normal proved to be a slow process. But to Bates, an encouraging sign arrived two days before Muncy’s first home run — when he stayed back on a sinker and dumped an opposite-field line drive into left-center.
Muncy has produced just the one home run — putting him in the same boat as Alec Bohm, Bo Bichette and Xander Bogaerts, and one ahead of Joc Pederson, Tommy Pham and Gabriel Moreno — and still doesn’t seem fully in sync. But he’s carrying a slightly more respectable .750 OPS since the start of that game on April 30. He’s drawing walks, displaying some power, and at some point, Bates believes, the home runs will come in bunches.
“It can be any at-bat,” Bates said, “he’s homering.”
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